Brando jeans, Brando leather jackets, Brando Harleys … Alarmed that the actor’s name and image may be used for commercial gain without its say-so, the Brando estate has applied for trademark protection with a patent and trademark office, write Dan Glaister and Oliver Burkeman.
Arnie drives a Hummer. And not just one. At one time the governor had a fleet of eight of the brutes to ferry him from photo op to photo op. He also has a private jet, which can be seen whooshing over the beach at Santa Monica as it takes him from his Los Angeles home to his office in Sacramento, 650km to the north.
Forty-three years after her death, a transcript surfaced recently purporting to be Marilyn Monroe’s words to her psychiatrist in the months before her death, Dan Glaister reports.
Is it possible to have a productive pooch? Can that faithful friend make an economic contribution to the home? Are big dogs more fuel efficient than small dogs? The answer is yes, yes and, er, quite possibly. The Integrated Waste AManagement Board has a vision. It is a vision of a world — or, more specifically, a San Francisco — where landfills are obsolete and doggie bags have a whole different meaning.
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/ 3 February 2006
There are bigger issues than glitz and glam behind this year’s nominations, reports Dan Glaister and Xan Brooks.
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/ 24 December 2005
”Let’s take the yellow brick road to Oz.” Alexander Shulgin shuffles ahead along the garden path leading out of his back door. At the end, about 27m away, a large squirrel is making its getaway from a ramshackle garden shed. ”The damn squirrel’s got in,” Sasha — as he is known — exclaims. ”A new hole, I’ll have to patch it up. They just eat their way through wood.’
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/ 12 December 2005
High up on the Bolivian altiplano near Lake Titicaca, an Aymara priest holds a green plastic lighter to a carved wooden cup containing strips of paper. Despite the fierce gusts of the early morning wind, the paper catches and smoke billows forth. The priest, dressed in traditional, brightly coloured robes, holds the smoking vessel before the presidential candidate.
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/ 18 February 2005
It is the moment feared and cherished by Oscar hopefuls: the envelope is opened, a name is read out and then the winner has to struggle to the stage to receive the coveted statuette. But not this year, writes Dan Glaister in Los Angeles.
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/ 1 December 2004
In a city awash with social problems, Grupo Mexico appears to be on the mend. The mud tracks are now paved, the armed guards who used to control the two entry points to the neighbourhood are gone, and the gangs only make their presence felt at night. But the area is still pitifully poor, its inhabitants scarred by drugs, guns and sexual violence.
For much of middle America, as well as middle England and middle France and very possibly Middle Earth, the war in Iraq really hit home on April 19 this year. Opening their newspaper comic supplements or turning to the editorial page where some newspapers place the Doonesbury strip, readers were shocked by yet another piece of grisly news from Iraq. And this was news about someone they knew, some for more than 30 years.